It's Time That You Won
by bloom-and-grow-forever
Summary: Kathryn and Chakotay navigate a relationship in the Delta Quadrant; title from "Falling Slowly"
1. Chapter 1

Hi, everyone. This is my first _Voyager_ fic, set after the events of "Hunters."

Huge thanks to escapeswithstories for her expertise and encouragement!

* * *

_Moving on from the past_. As the words left her lips, Kathryn's throat dried so suddenly that she thought she might gag. _Moving on from me._ Hours later, even after Neelix's party and the pleasure of her crew's company, the nausea lingered. Now, in her quarters, well and truly alone for the first time all day, she had no one to hide from as she regurgitated years of buried feelings.

The hope when she saw Mark next to her in the turbolift, and the anguish that came with the realization that an alien had taken over her mind.

The helplessness as she packed on New Earth, preparing to leave behind so much more than what she came with.

The regret as she watched her crew mourn at her own funeral, and being unable to reciprocate her feelings for them.

The exhaustion of holding out hope for a triumphant return day after day after day, without knowing exactly what she hoped to find back home.

Now _this_.

Kathryn hovered over her toilet, preparing for another wave of nausea to morph into acidic coffee and whatever half-digested concoction she forced herself to eat in the mess hall. _Was this punishment? _Punishment for kissing a hologram? For deviating from the prime directive? For cutting her goddamn hair? No, if Kathryn was being punished, she knew her transgression. She knew when it happened, as she laced her fingers through Chakotay's, shedding tears over what she would not allow but desperately wanted. She knew it, but she couldn't—wouldn't—think of Mark then.

But Mark had still been thinking of her.

After that thought emptied what little remained in her stomach, Kathryn slumped against the nearest wall and held her head in her hands. She knew that Mark would never blame her for anything that happened in the Delta Quadrant, just as she knew that when she managed to regain control of her emotions, she wouldn't blame herself either. This pain was born of guilt, not heartbreak.

Now, though, as the remnants of the hair Mark loved to thread his fingers through brushed against her cheek, all she could focus on were the now-faded memories that got her through the first few months of their voyage. Years ago, Kathryn would wake up thinking about the morning before she left to prepare for _Voyager_'s launch, when Mark convinced her to climb back into bed, to let him bother her the way she loved to be bothered. During those depressing first months, she would close her eyes at night remembering the first time she fell ill after they started dating, when Mark brought her soup and administered her prescription hypospray when she slept through her reminder alarm. Back then, on any given day, Kathryn could swear she heard him call her name as she walked down a corridor, and the ache of reality was so acute that she had to catch the wall.

Somehow, between near-death experiences and Neelix's luaus, life without Mark had become bearable, but just as unexpectedly, the pain returned in an entirely different form. The agony of missing and loving Mark morphed into grief over what they lost, until she hardly felt anything when her thoughts wandered to him.

Now _this_.

Of course Mark moved on—how could she expect him to pine over her every day for the rest of his life, when she couldn't do the same? Their love, immense as it felt before they parted, was not enough. Or did the blame fall on her crowded heart? Had she not made enough room for Mark, with the crew and Starfleet demanding so much from her? And for what? As captain, who led her beloved crew members into the perilous unknown day after day, she couldn't even afford to express just how much these 150 souls meant to her. Mark, on the other hand, was free to accept her affection every day for the rest of their lives.

So why had it not been enough?

Even after she dragged herself off the bathroom floor and into her bed, these questions prevented sleep. As she had for so many nights lately, Kathryn decided that she would rather spend the night working than battling insomnia. Yanking on her uniform, she decided the mess hall was as good a place as any to not sleep. She scooped up a pile of PADDs that she'd abandoned an hour ago, and hoped that making the conscious decision to be useful instead of wallowing in self-pity would sharpen her focus. If the universe had any mercy left to give, Neelix would not be in the mess hall to deny her coffee or pester her with his concern.

As her door slid open, Kathryn realized that the universe had a more sinister plan up her sleeve.

Chakotay, despite having approached her door in the middle of the night, appeared more surprised than Kathryn. He held up a couple of PADDs by way of explanation, but Kathryn saw through his pretense. "I was just going to drop these off, but I wasn't sure you'd be awake."

He'd always been a lousy liar.

"I can't sleep. I'm heading to the mess hall for a night cap and overdue engineering reports." Kathryn avoided Chakotay's gaze but held out a hand for the PADDs. "I'll add these to my to-do list."

"I don't suppose you'll let me join you?"

Kathryn swallowed her heavy sigh. In her ready room, when she uttered Mark's decision out loud, Chakotay felt closer than she'd permitted in months. Chakotay was her friend, but unlike any other friend she'd had. He cared for her inordinately, and he trusted her implicitly, but some days Kathryn couldn't identify his motives. His loyalty as her first officer had always been clear, but the fluctuating boundaries of their friendship baffled her. Perhaps it was that specific ignorance that allowed her to categorize their relationship as platonic.

"It's kind of you to offer, but I don't think this ship can handle more than one exhausted senior officer on the bridge." Teasing each other had always been easy, but tonight her banter sounded forced.

Chakotay, to his credit, smiled even as she delivered the blow. "Perhaps you're right. I just thought…" He hesitated, eyes darting away from her face to her comm badge. "I can't help but notice that you've been distracted, and I want to help."

Though her first thought indicated the opposite, maybe Chakotay could help. It didn't have to mean anything other than what she needed it to mean—a conversation with her best friend, maybe the only person who could help her take a breath. Of course, Chakotay had a knack for forcing her to confront her feelings, no matter how conflicted. Her moral compass strained in the opposite direction of Chakotay's warm eyes and impossible dimples.

"Coffee first."

* * *

Glaring at the replicator, Kathryn waited for her undoubtedly mediocre coffee to appear. Hard as she tried to avoid eye contact with Chakotay all the way to the mess hall, she could feel his gaze like the sun on her back. Their silent trek to the mess hall left Kathryn plenty of time to regret her decision for a number of reasons. If the rumors were true, Chakotay had far more to grieve than she did. All of his friends and comrades were dead or in prison, and he insisted on concerning himself with her mess.

What a waste of his adoration.

"Chakotay." Kathryn sat down across from him, hoping that the softness of her voice would make this easier. "You know that I appreciate your concern, but there are so many other things—people, for that matter—that need your attention." _Your support, your loyalty, your comfort. _

Chakotay nodded slowly, glancing stack of PADDs Kathryn had laid out as if she truly intended to work. "If you're referring to my former Maquis crewmembers, I spent the every free moment I had yesterday informing them of the news and making them promise to come to me if they needed to talk. A few have taken me up on that offer already. The rest have each other to lean on if they don't feel comfortable coming to me just yet. Hell, some officers who were never under my command have come to me. I care about everyone on this ship, and I want to make sure everyone knows they can confide in me."

For the first time since she saw him, anger overpowered her other emotions. Kathryn cocked an eyebrow and tightened her grip on the warm coffee mug. "And I suppose admitting to you that I used my fiancé as a safety net meant nothing by way of confiding?"

"Of course it did." While he did not raise his voice, Chakotay's words carried such impact that Kathryn felt ashamed for stooping so low. Of all Chakotay's faults, apathy was not among them. "I just want to make sure there's nothing else you need to say."

"Of course there's more to say, Chakotay," Kathryn sighed, leaning back in her chair. "I just don't know how to talk to you about it—or even if I should."

His serenity in the face of her simmering emotional turmoil made Kathryn want to shake him and ask where his anger was, but just as he had no right to infringe on her process, she had no right to accelerate his.

"I know you don't want to hear this, but I meant what I said." Chakotay waited until Kathryn met his gaze before continuing. "Your needs come first."

Damn him. Damn him for knowing. Damn him for respecting her parameters and bending them at the same time.

"The only thing I know that I need is to get this crew home, but beyond that—" She threw a hand in the air and leapt from her chair, consumed by a sudden desire to flee. She settled for wearing a hole in the deck, running her fingers through her hair and willing her breath to slow. "I'm a _person_, but I can't be that anymore. When I stepped into command, I knew that I was looking at a career in emotional isolation, but _God_. This is going to be the rest of my life, with no reprieve, no going home at the end of the day. Mark moved on, and of course he has every right. I'm shocked he'd shackled himself to me for four years of uncertainty and doubt and fear. It hurts, but not in the way that it should. It hurts because I've trapped myself."

She paused for breath, leaning on both hands on an adjacent table. Back bowed, head hung, she blinked away the tears blurring her vision. Being trapped without sight could only make this worse.

"I'm trapped even surrounded by tens of thousands of uncharted space. Sandwiched between my morals and my rights as a human being, between my duties and my needs. My heart isn't even broken in the right way because I want to get everyone home more than I want to be with the man I was going to spend the rest of my life with. In order to send you all out on away missions from which you may never return, I've closed myself off. I used to feel things so severely, but now I spend most of my days numb." Numb to the loss of Mark, her mother, her sister, her Molly. "It usually keeps me in check, keeps me from losing my mind. But _this_."

Kathryn's next breath cost the tenuous control over her tears, but she fought like hell to get it back. When she choked on the lump in her throat, Chakotay's hand rested on her back.

"Pain is pain, Kathryn, and it's okay to feel it," he murmured, his breath warm behind her ear. "You know you would tell me or anyone else on this ship the same thing. It's worse for everyone if you don't let yourself go through this."

Shuddering with the effort to breathe, Kathryn shook her head. "What good is _feeling_ anything if I'm still numb when it's over?" No lesson learned, no improvements made—just back to nothingness.

This emotional isolation too closely resembled the depression she fell into after Justin and her father died. In the Delta Quadrant, she didn't have the time to pat herself on the back for bothering to get out of bed or eating more than one meal a day. No, she couldn't go back there, because without Phoebe or her mother, who would pull her out?

"You don't have to be."

Kathryn's bitter laugh reverberated off the mess hall walls. "But I do. It's a vicious cycle, isn't it?" When Chakotay sighed, she squeezed her eyes shut, hoping that squeezing the tears out faster would make them stop. Putting an end to this would be better for them both.

"Kathryn, I don't understand."

_No, and that's my fault too_.

Chakotay, who found out just days ago that his friends, his chosen family, were all dead or imprisoned for life, could understand the consequences of love. But he couldn't understand her predicament without knowing the past that Kathryn refused to share with him.

Straightening from her hunched position over the table, Kathryn turned to face her friend, searching his eyes for the answer to a revealing question she didn't want to ask. "I wish I were more like you," she murmured. Before she could act on her desire to hold his hand, Chakotay interlaced their fingers. "You care openly about those under your command, knowing that any day could be their last."

Hesitating only for a second, Chakotay countered, "Don't your feelings for me count as open care?"

_Oh_. Those feelings counted for everything, but they cost her too. "You're different." As Chakotay's thumb brushed over the thumping pulse at her wrist, Kathryn cursed her body's betrayal. _This_ was the last thing she could handle right now. Her feelings for Chakotay had developed out of the need for companionship. As much as she sometimes truly believed that she was alone, she trusted Chakotay with her life, and for the longest time, that was as far as she allowed it to go. She couldn't control the transition, the change in her feelings for Chakotay that transformed him from her first officer and friend to the one person she couldn't imagine her life without.

Another adverse effect of being in command constantly was that Kathryn forgot that both parties in a relationship have agency.

Chakotay replicated her birthday presents. He accompanied her to every morale party, no matter how ridiculous the theme or how exhausted he was. He made her dinner when the replicator betrayed them both. He cradled her lifeless body to his chest and begged her to come back.

And now her safety net was gone.

Her safety net was gone, and _God_ was she falling. She felt that more than ever as Chakotay cupped her cheek in his palm.

"I can't banish your unpleasant feelings, but I can promise that it's possible to love someone that you know you could lose any second. You don't have to be alone to function, Kathryn."

Kathryn felt her pulse throb faster in her neck. _I can't. We can't. This won't work._ But she couldn't pull away.

"Do you trust me?" His other hand tucked a few unruly tufts of hair behind her ear, and lingered on her neck.

"We've been over this, Chakotay. Trust has never been the issue."

The hint of frustration Kathryn expected from Chakotay never asserted itself. "Fine. Do you love me?"

That's one way to stop a pulse.

"Because if you love me as much as I love you, there's no avoiding the pain, no matter how hard we try. We can either deal with it on our own, or we can get through this together, the way we do everything else."

Part of her wanted to throw him down on the mess hall floor and kiss him breathless, but the other wanted to run to the nearest shuttle bay and get as far away as possible. In what her frazzled brain deemed a suitable compromise, Kathryn backed away until her calves collided with a chair to collapse in. She didn't remember love feeling so nauseating, but then again, fear drove her away from Chakotay just now, not love.

Fear, an enemy she had defeated in the flesh, dictated her every feeling—for Chakotay, for her crew. Fear had been so much easier to conquer when it had been tangible, a mere man, but regardless, she faced it every day. When she looked at Chakotay, sitting next to her on the bridge every day, the fear lessened, and while the promise of Mark remained, it allowed her to ignore the implications of her feelings.

Yes, she was falling, but perhaps her love could be stronger than her fear.

Chakotay had the sense to keep his distance while Kathryn sorted her thoughts, but the anguish on his face was unbearable. "I'm sorry. That was too much at once. That was insensitive."

Kathryn shook her head slowly, and held out her hand. "Come here." When she noticed Chakotay's hesitance, the tension in his shoulders, she smiled softly, hoping to assuage his doubts. He settled in the chair next to her, and Kathryn rose, tightening her hold on his sweaty hand, and climbed into his lap. Now his pulse thundered underneath her hands as she skimmed them up his neck and into his hair. "If you promise to love me no matter what, you can overwhelm me anytime."

Her teasing did not ease Chakotay's tension, but she knew that only one thing could.

"Kathryn—"

A slender finger over his lips prevented protest or proclamation. "I love you."

Chakotay's lips stretched into a toothless grin beneath Kathryn's finger, and he kissed it, wrapping his hand around her wrist. Kathryn watched with tears pooling in her eyes as he kissed her palm and her wrist, his other arm winding around her back to pull her closer. Kathryn made him work for the second kiss to the inside of her wrist, bringing her hand close to her chin. Chakotay hummed against her skin before he nipped at her chin, but Kathryn, no longer in the mood to be patient, captured his mouth before he could delay further.

Immediately, Kathryn felt the tension deflate in Chakotay's shoulders, and for a moment, she could forget every excuse to deny herself this pleasure of being treasured by another person. Her lips parted easily under his, soft and warm and not safe at all. It shouldn't feel this good to give in to something she knew could hurt her, but from the first time he touched her like this, massaging her pain away on New Earth, he felt good. It had been easy to remember the consequences of love, rather than the joys of it.

Kathryn waited until dizziness threatened to ruin the moment before resting her forehead against Chakotay's. His panting breaths came in puffs against her lips, and Kathryn relished in the intimacy. "You're going to have to be patient with me," she husked. "I don't know how this is going to work, so please give me time to figure it out."

Chakotay's thumbs caressed the skin of her hips, just underneath her untucked gray tank, and Kathryn shivered. "We can do that together too."


	2. Chapter 2

After twenty minutes of retention-deficient staring, Chakotay had only read a page of B'Elanna's report. He thought the early escape from the Void would sharpen his focus, but their unexpected triumph left him inept at focusing on the mundane. Unfortunately, his thoughts erred on the side of negativity, rather than gratitude. Despite Neelix's best efforts, the post-escape euphoria proved ephemeral, since they still had to get home. Hope used to sweeten their victories, but after almost five years, hope only slowed them down.

He shook his head. That line of thought drove Kathryn Janeway into her depression. Sure, she wanted everyone to believe that the Void had been the sole instigator and that after their miraculous escape, everything would return to normal. But he knew better.

Two days before _Voyager_ entered the Void, Kathryn kicked him out.

They weren't living together by any stretch of the imagination (of that, Kathryn had always been clear), but whenever the duty roster allowed, they spent their nights together. Replicated dinners, holodeck privileges, quiet nights on the couch with good books, decidedly less quiet nights in bed—such bliss held some of the only hope either of them had left lately. The smiles that Kathryn used to cast freely on the bridge had become a rarity there, but whenever she was alone with him, her smiles or laughter surprised her too much to suppress. For the first few weeks of their nights together, she remained in her uniform pants and turtleneck, her pips stark and invasive in the artificial light. A month in, the pips disappeared in favor of her Starfleet-issue gray tank or, on his favorite evenings, one of his shirts. The sigh he thought restricted only to the massage on New Earth graced her lips every time he wrapped his arms around her. He thought he made her happy.

But the Void had him questioning the validity of his assumption.

Kathryn had tried to push him away before, but after what they confessed to each other so many months ago, Chakotay hoped that she would be willing to fight her demons with him.

Instead, she locked herself in her quarters.

Instead, she _ordered_ him to leave her behind in the Void.

For the first time, Chakotay understood the fear that prevented their relationship for so long. While he had never dismissed Kathryn's reasons, he never considered that he would be the one ordered to condemn her to death. Now, he realized that while he had the luxury of defying orders, Captain Kathryn Janeway did not.

When his door chimed, Chakotay sighed, tossing the PADD on his desk and rubbing his hands over his face. Until Kathryn returned to normal, or at least returned to him, he had to keep up the farce for the crew. _Everything is fine. She's fine. I'm fine_.

"Come in."

On instinct, he stood when Kathryn entered his quarters. She used to tease him constantly about his need to indulge the chain of command, even in the most private settings.

_It's sexy_, she'd giggled, before the Void. Her complement had carried little weight in the face of her fit. _No, really, I'm sorry. You're just so cute when you're flustered. _

God, he missed her.

Kathryn looked only marginally better than she had the last time she let him in her quarters, to discuss ship functions and morale. She no longer avoided the light like a spatial anomaly, but as she neared him,he swore he saw the Void reflected in her eyes.

"I'm sorry."

The words tumbled out of her mouth before Chakotay could think about what to say to her. "What exactly are you sorry for?" He rounded his desk to eliminate as many barriers as he could.

Kathryn folded her hands in front of her, chin high and pride renewed. "I'm not sorry for ordering you to leave me behind, if that's what you mean." The edge in her voice confirmed Chakotay's fear that his question sounded confrontational.

"It's not," Chakotay assured her. He leaned back against his desk, hands gripping the edge so he could better resist the urge to hold her.

In vain, he fought the gravitational pull Kathryn had on him. Kathryn heaved a sigh and strode the three steps it took to invade his personal space. Her hands had never felt so frozen on his cheeks. "I'm sorry that I shut you out, that I put you in an uncomfortable position with the crew, that I can't even have this conversation without starting a fight."

"It's okay. You're not supposed to have the right answer to everything, Kathryn." Chakotay squeezed her hips and rested his forehead against hers. "I've missed you so much." Tentatively, he leaned in and kissed her bottom lip. When she did not tense or pull away, he devoured her like he'd wanted to for two months. They had so much to discuss, so much healing to do, but this could be a start. Where his words could fail to convey the depth of his love, his body would not.

"Let me take you to bed," he panted against her neck.

Kathryn's first chuckle not drenched in mirth vibrated against Chakotay's lips, and while it delighted him to hear, he more readily welcomed the breathy gasps that replaced it when he slid his hands down her back, over her ass, and under her thighs. When he lifted, her legs locked around his hips, and she refused to let go until only her pants remained for Chakotay to peel from her body. Kathryn took over then, stripping him bare and whispering her love into his skin.

* * *

"As delectable as that was," Chakotay murmured into Kathryn's hair, "we need to talk about this."

Kathryn hummed into his chest and pulled his sheets tighter around them. Chakotay's always set his environmental controls cooler than hers, but he never failed to keep her warm.

Lately, she'd been cold all the time.

"I know." Her voice, hoarse from exertion, stumbled over the syllables. "Remember when I said that I'd need time to figure this out?"

Chakotay skimmed his knuckles up and down her back. "I do. I also remember us agreeing to work through struggles like these together."

While there was no accusation in his tone, the truth still stung. "I know. It's been a long time since I've been that depressed, Chakotay. I…couldn't see past the nothingness I'd led us to."

"And that's passed now?"

Kathryn forced herself to not be offended by the doubt in Chakotay's voice. "No. I suppose it hasn't." She drew infinity symbols on Chakotay's stomach. "I don't know where to start here, Chakotay."

"How about you just tell me what you're feeling?"

Kathryn wasn't sure if she could describe all that she felt. "Guilty." Starting with the obvious never hurt anyone. "Depressed. Exhausted by the depression and guilt. Frustrated with my inability to conquer this for the good of my crew—" She felt her voice begin to shake before she noticed the tears welling in her eyes. "Lost and headed in an impossible direction."

Chakotay ran his fingers through Kathryn's hair a few times, the rhythm soothing her enough to feel the comfort over the din of everything else. "You don't have to conquer it right now," he finally said. "What you did today—walking on the bridge right when we needed you? The crew needed to see that."

"I just showed them how willing I was to give up." The words that had been driving her mad for hours, days, weeks, tumbled out. "I hid in my quarters, keeping everyone in the dark, expecting you to take up for me because I couldn't face my own decisions. Then, when I finally show my face, it's to force my crew to allow me to give up, so I don't have to shoulder the responsibility anymore."

"You really think that's why you did it?"

Chakotay's quick response didn't surprise Kathryn as much as the implication. She pushed off his chest and clutched his sheets to her breast. "Since when did you presume to know more about my motives than I do?"

"I don't—it was a genuine question."

For the first time, Kathryn felt his frustration encompass the bedroom. His eyes told her that he didn't mean to let it seep through, but the set of his jaw betrayed his true feelings. Shaking her head, to either loosen the thoughts' grip on her mind or to convey her disappointment, Kathryn tossed the covers into his face and reached for her nearest piece of clothing. She cursed when she grasped a sock.

"Kathryn, please don't run away," Chakotay begged. The apology teetered on the tip of his tongue, evident in his tone, but Kathryn refused to settle. As she yanked her tank over her head, he relented.

"Kathryn, I'm sorry that you were alone."

Kathryn's mirthless laugh returned, slicing the apology in half. "You'd think that's where I'd be the most comfortable. No one to hurt. Only myself to blame."

"No one blames you."

Kathryn turned and knelt on the bed in front of him, cupping his flushed face in her hands. Bless this man, whose irritation spurred from his partner's inability to see rather than from the gaping wound she'd inflicted. "Chakotay, unconditional love is what _you_ feel for me. Not everyone shares that."

Chakotay wiped the fresh tears from her cheeks. "You're selling your crew short. It doesn't take unconditional love to be empathetic, Kathryn. They're not heartless."

"There has to be a limit, Chakotay," Kathryn hissed. Her sudden anger had no clear target, but it consumed her. "There has to be a limit to what these people can take. What _you_ can take." She wrenched out of his gentle hold and paced in front of the bed. "You said that you're sorry that I was alone, but if I'd let you stay, we wouldn't be here right now, together."

Chakotay's jaw dropped. "You thought I'd leave you."

Kathryn stopped pacing, her back to him, and wound both arms around her stomach. After everything, she would push him away with her presumptions. "You have every right to leave."

"Is that what you think of me? That I'd bail on you at a time like this?"

"Obviously, I was wrong," Kathryn said, eyes fixed on the stars she'd missed. "I'm sorry that it took ordering you to leave me behind for me to realize that." When she heard the sheets rustle, she knew to expect his hands on her shoulders. "That's the thing about depression, Chakotay. You don't think clearly," she whispered.

"I know."

Of course he did. How could she be thoughtless enough to disqualify him because his pain had been different from hers?

Chakotay sighed. "Next time, allow me courtesy of letting me make my own decisions about our relationship, okay?"

Kathryn could only nod and wonder at Chakotay's capacity to remain calm in the face of her potentially devastating emotional blunders.

"Kathryn, if you order me to leave you to die again, I won't do it." The certainty in his voice washed over Kathryn in what should have been disappointment. She found only resignation. "I realize now that you can't avoid that decision."

Kathryn covered his hands with hers and squeezed. "No I can't. I'm still learning to live in that reality."

"Do you regret this relationship?"

Stunned, Kathryn whirled around to face him. "Of course not."

Chakotay smiled, as if he'd expected this answer, and ran his hands down her arms. "Would that reality be easier to live in if you knew that I don't either? That I would rather die having known this love than live without it?"

Kathryn bit her trembling bottom lip. God, how she wanted that to be enough. "I guess I'll just have to live a little and find out, won't I?"

He wrapped his arms around her just in time for her to muffle her sob in his shoulder.

Weeks of self-loathing fueled her tears, and she had no idea when they would dry. For all her time spent in the dark, she'd never shed a tear for herself or her crew or her decisions. Even now, she didn't know for whom these tears flowed, only that she had to let them out to avoid the heaviness that had taken residence in her soul.

* * *

Chakotay waited until her breathing slowed before he spoke again. Tonight barely scratched the surface of all they needed to discuss, but he knew she needed to regroup before the delved any further into this conversation.

As Kathryn detangled her limbs from his embrace and wiped the tear tracks from her cheeks, Chakotay realized that Kathryn may not be able to stay. "Will you spend the night?"

Kathryn furrowed her brow and cupped his cheek in her hand. "Of course," she whispered. "I should be asking you if I can stay."

Chakotay held her hand and tugged her toward his disheveled bed. "Always." He let his assurance sink in before adding some levity to their evening. "Besides, after what transpired in that bed, do you think I'll ever let you go again?"

Kathryn's right hook nearly incapacitated his shoulder, but he laughed through the pain. "Oh, that's why you keep me around?" She shed her top and burrowed under the covers, but her eyes remained fixed on Chakotay's face. She smiled when he climbed over her, his body aligned just inches above hers.

"I _keep you around_ because I love you."

Shaking her head, Kathryn pulled him down for a kiss. "I don't deserve you," she murmured against his lips.

Chakotay's heart ached for her to understand that she deserved more than he could give. "I'm going to make it my mission to show you just how wrong you are, Captain." Settling his weight on his elbows so that they skimmed her shoulders, he inched the sheet down her breasts and bent low to kiss the undersides. "I don't ever want you to feel that alone ever again." He hated to disturb the peace that had suddenly replaced the raw misery of before, but she had to understand. "Please, Kathryn. Please come to me next time. Don't shut me out."

With her hands on either side of his head, Kathryn dragged him up her body, and he drowned in the galaxy of her eyes. Hints of the Void remained, but the beginnings of hope shone through like the stars he thought he would never see again. "I'll work on it," she promised, raking her nails through his hair. "I'm glad you didn't give up on me."

"I'll always fight for you, even if that means fighting you," Chakotay said. He grunted when Kathryn flipped them over and straddled his hips.

"You love a good fight, don't you?"

Kathryn's tone dipped on _good fight_, and stripped Chakotay of his remaining restraint. He sat up abruptly, gripping her hips so she wouldn't topple off of him. "A good _fight_, huh?" His stomach clenched when he _felt_ her hum. "I've got a fight for you."

Kathryn yelped as he fell forward, landing her on her back with her legs trapped underneath his solid thighs. One roll of his hips had Kathryn sighing his name. Chakotay kissed his way up her neck, to her ear. "Bet I can make you tap out first."

Kathryn mewled and stretched her arms above her head as he kissed his way down her stomach. "You're making it harder to resist."

Chakotay dipped his tongue into her navel. "Then don't." He growled when Kathryn yanked on his hair, clearly not giving up just yet. He slid back up her body, ensuring blows delivered even in his obedience. "Something I can do for you?" he teased as he kissed her nose.

The mischief in Kathryn's eyes had been replaced by boundless adoration. "Thank you for loving me no matter what."

"I promised, didn't I?" Before she could retort, Chakotay dipped his tongue into the base of her throat, pleased to taste the salt of her sweat. "I'm not going to ask that you forgive yourself right now, but at least take the first step and accept my love as yours." When Kathryn smiled down at him and nodded, he squeezed her sides. "_No matter what_."


End file.
